Letter to August Bebel, August 30, 1887

Author(s) Friedrich Engels
Written 30 August 1887


First published in: Marx and Engels, Works, First Russian Edition, Vol. XXVII, Moscow, 1935
Printed according to the original
Published in English for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 48


ENGELS TO AUGUST BEBEL

IN PLAUEN NEAR DRESDEN

Eastbourne, 30 August 1887

Dear Bebel,

I am tremendously glad that you are so willing to fall in with my little plan.[1] I shall expect to see you in London in the early part of October and only regret that you cannot come straight away and spend a week here in the bracing sea air. My house still being at sixes and sevens, I have had to stay here another week but we shall be going home on Friday, 2 September.[2]

Everything else I shall leave until we meet but, since you are going to Hamburg, just one more word. I have been corresponding with Wedde about a plan they have been hatching there. Unfortunately, however, I could not comply with his wishes since the plan—at any rate so far as I could judge from what Wedde told me—had been worked out in total ignorance of the law in this country and, more especially, of procedure in civil cases.[3] Might I now ask you, when in Hamburg, to get Wedde to explain the whole plan in detail to you again so that we can discuss it exhaustively over here, for if the thing is at all feasible, I would gladly do all I could, both for the sake of the cause and to oblige Wedde. If the worst comes to the worst and nothing can be done, I hope to convince you that such is really the case, and even this would mean quite a lot to me.

So in about 3 or 4 weeks' time I hope to hear when you will be arriv- ing. In the meantime please remember me most kindly to your wife and daughter.[4] With warmest regards,

Your

F. E.

  1. ↑ See this volume, pp.94 95
  2. ↑ Engels holidayed in Eastbourne from 23 July to 2 September.
  3. ↑ Joannes Wedde, the editor of the Hamburg newspaper Biirger-Zeitung, with whom Engels was in correspondence, applied to him with the request to help the FreundschaftsClubs der Zigarren-Sortierer deposit the money, saved up by this alliance (10,000 Reichs marks), in the English bank, so as to protect this sum against a possible confiscation by the authorities. Wedde asked Engels either to deposit this money to his name or help find a man who might mediate in this transaction.
  4. ↑ Julia and Frieda Bebel